Avatars
by Wingstar102
Summary: This had to be the most bizarre conversation Tim's ever had. Especially because a White Wolf game isn't your daddy's D&D!


**A/N:** Written for the Role-Playing Challenge on NFA. And yes, I know not everything for the White Wolf games are here. Too much information to include. White Wolf and NCIS don't belong to me. Enjoy!

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"What's all this McGee?"

Barely glancing up from the papers spread across his desk to acknowledge Tony, he didn't realize his team mate was holding the stack of mostly complete character sheets and not one of the neatly organized cold case files the team had been working on for the last couple of days. "Depends. What are you talking about?"

"These." Tony tilted the papers far enough for Tim, as he properly looked up this time, to get a good look at what he was holding before righting them. "They almost look like those old Dungeons and Dragons character sheets, but I've never seen any quite like this."

"I know." Blushing a little, Tim shrugged and went back to working on the sheets in front of him, kind of embarrassed to be caught. "It's for when I need a break and mostly it's just something to keep me busy and help me relax. Different way of exercising my mind than normal. Figured I'd work on them since I'm done with my stack of cases." When Tony waved his hands for him to continue, almost wrinkling the papers in the process, Tim sighed and set his pencil down. "A company called White Wolf created a series of gothic-punk role-playing games. The papers you're holding are character sheets for them."

Making an exaggerated noise of curiosity, obstinately to irritate Tim a little and not because he wanted to draw attention to them, he looked more closely at the words and dots, all but ignoring the penciled-in information. The more he read, the more confused he got. "What the hell is auspice? And Gnosis? Kind of character is this McGeek?"

Tim finally stopped working on the Mage character he was creating for himself, seeing the futility while the Senior Agent was bent on distracting him, and set his pencil down. "It's a Werewolf character, Tony. Auspice is like a Werewolf's zodiac sign. It gives the character certain advantages in the game." Tim watched him going over the sheet again and was sure Tony was only half-listening as he continued. "Gnosis is how spiritually in-tune your character is."

Not that he would admit it, but Tony was listening intently and hoping Ziva, who was quietly plugging away at her own pile of cold cases at her desk, was starting to listen in too. Sure enough, the almost unnoticeable tapping of her foot, a habit Ziva picked after her first couple of months on the team for when paperwork kept her sitting down for too long, had stopped and he heard her put down her pen. But just as Tony opened his mouth to call her over, one of the penciled parts caught his attention. _L.J. Gibbs_. Well, he really couldn't let that go unquestioned. "You make this one for the Boss?"

Blushing such a deep scarlet that it highlighted just how green his eyes really were, Tim only nodded, further embarrassment clogging his throat too much to voice his answer. And then, to make things even worse, Ziva got up from her desk and sauntered over.

"What are you two discussing over here? It does not sound like work."

Tony grinned and passed her the papers. "Looks like Tim's writing hobby isn't limited to books, Ziva."

"Really?" Ziva was a little more thorough when she flipped through them. "There seems to be a character for me, Gibbs and you, Tony."

"Me?" Tony sounded sort of excited and held his hand out. Ziva obliged, giving over the bottom four pages.

Tim groaned quietly to himself. Having spent hours on each character, he knew exactly what Tony would see. Tony's own life, spelled out in dots and disciplines, allies and history and flaws. Everything that he was as a person, reflected on paper. To be fair, that's what Tim wanted to do. Wanted to see if he could capture the very essence to his team mates into something he could play. Tim felt he had succeeded.

But of course Tony wouldn't understand what he was looking at. Proved it even, when he asked, "What's a Malkavian?"

Tim groaned again, a little louder than last time. "You don't want to know."

"Oh, come on! It can't be too bad."

"Ok. Just remember, you asked." He took a deep breath to steel himself. "Malkavians are self-stylized prophets in the game. Most other vampires think they're crazy though, because Malkavians act kind of… odd." Tim shrugged and gave his own opinion. "I think it's a little of both. Depends on how you play the character."

"Really? What about mine?" Tony looked genuinely interested, so Tim figured it couldn't hurt to tell him.

"Well, I built yours to be like you." Ziva chuckled, having understood what Tim meant, as she put Gibbs' sheet back on Tim's desk while hanging on to her own, but Tony gave him a blank look. "I made him a cop, before he was turned, with all the stats and he has your connections and abilities. He was even turned because another Malkavian ended up being a small part of an investigation he was working on and saw the flashes of intuition and instinct as something prophetic. This character is very flashy and decadent on the outside, and a fun-loving, goofy prankster on the inside."

Tony gave an uncertain little chuckle. "I think you've got the outside and inside parts mixed up. Plus, I can be serious!"

He snatched the papers back from Tony, shuffling the top page to the bottom of the set. "Got that covered." Motioning his team mate closer, he pointed at a little subsection called 'Derangements' on the second page. "All Malkavians have some kind of mental instability, because of the curse of Malkav's blood. Yours are fugue states. Basically blackouts. Under enough stress, you enter into one of these states and end up having to do something to correct whatever caused the stress, so that you can snap out of it. Cool, yeah?"

"That _is_ pretty cool. I don't see how it fits my character though."

Tim grinned. "That's the best part, to me anyway. This character has pretty developed instincts and ethics because he was a police officer. Well, he gets pretty upset that he can't ever remember what happens in a fugue state, so he investigates to find out. It's really one of the few instances when he's serious about anything. Same as you do."

"Ok, I can see that."

Just as he was about to get into even more detail, Ziva piped up with a question of her own. "McGee, why is the certificate of death not filled out for my character? Everything else has been added."

"Oh." Blush returning in full force, Tim stammered slightly though his explanation. "Well, I-I think it's bad luck to fill that out for someone else, almost like walking over their grave. Anybody who plays in my games with a Wraith character has to fill out the death certificate themselves. It's one of my House rules."

"I can see how it could make you uncomfortable, given what our line of work is."

"Yeah. Honestly, I wouldn't even require it if the character's manner of death wasn't so important to the story." He shrugged. "It really sucks when a person asks me to make them a Wraith character to play. A lot of people would rather I make the certificate."

Ziva quickly changed the topic to something less gruesome. "What is Moliate?"

Happy for the new question, Tim chuckled in delight and dove into the subject. "Moliate is one of my favorites. Since the general theory is that ghosts and the like are made of plasma, it stands to reason that they could change their shape. That's what Moliate is. In fact, it's commonly called Soul-shaping, because a Wraith can spend a few points of pathos and change the shape of herself _or_ another Wraith into anything she wants, so long as it's got about the same volume."

"Wow." Ziva's eyes flitted over to Tony for a second to see his slightly awed reaction before turning back to McGee. "That is a lot of information to ingest."

Her head snapped around to glare at Tony when he started to cackle. "I think you mean _digest,_ Ziva. You digest information, not ingest it."

"Anyway," Tim interrupted, hoping to divert Ziva's attention before she smacked Tony, "Moliate is a skill best used by artists and assassins. You have to have a really great imagination to use it well. I think you would have a lot of fun with it, Ziva."

"I could." Ziva flashed a wicked grin. "There have been some situations where I have needed a tool and not had it. But what is this _pathos_ you must pay to change a shape?"

"Oh! Um…" It was a struggle for Tim to find a way to explain. An experienced player wouldn't have a problem understanding that the pathos score was based on passions, but Ziva? Or what, exactly, pathos was, beyond an emotionally driven, but otherwise unspecified, resource of Wraith characters? She wouldn't take that for an answer either, Tim knew. Instead, he decided a simple answer was best. "Basically, pathos is magic, but for Wraiths. All Wraiths start with five pathos but can get more through a whole bunch of ways."

"Hey! Wait a minute!" Tony, while Tim was telling Ziva about the Wraith he'd created, had been looking closer at the Vampire's stats. "How come this one doesn't have magic?"

He smiled brightly. This was the part he liked best about role-playing: delving into the intricacies of it all. The worlds, the characters, the plots and details for each. "All characters have magic, Tony. For Vampires, it's in their blood. In Vampire disciplines, what they call their magic, they can basically use magic inherent to their Clan. Some types of disciplines can be used without spending blood points and others have a blood cost. Depends on your disciplines and what level they're at." Tim picked up Gibbs' character from where Ziva had put it and showed Tony the top page. "See? All preternatural and supernatural entities have magic. For Werewolves they're called gifts. Mages are obvious, since they're Mages. Demons, Changlings, Mummies, Hunters, all have some kind of magic."

"I see." Tony's eyes glanced at Tim's desk, a thoughtful expression on his face, before asking, "I don't see any books and this is a lot of stuff to know. Don't these games come with books?"

"Yeah, they do." Tim went back to blushing, not nearly as hard as a few minutes ago, while reaching around the other side of his chair and into his open backpack. The three books he pulled out were obviously well-used and just as obviously well-maintained. "These are the corebooks for those three characters." Tony moved to snatch them out of Tim's hands but Tim held them back for a moment. "Please be very careful with them. They're old and very hard to find."

Tony carefully took the Vampire book from the stack when Tim held them out again. "You got it buddy."

Ziva also quickly snatched the Wraith book from McGee, and almost dropped it when Gibbs' voice suddenly spoke up from behind her. "What about mine McGee?"

Tim paled. "Hey Boss. We were just, um… Just…"

Ziva and Tony backed up so that Tim had a clear view of their Boss. He looked curious and not irritated at them for getting side-tracked, but Tim was still a little panicked, sure that Gibbs wouldn't be happy with what Tim had done.

But Gibbs' tone also allowed no room for refusal. "I know what you guys were doing. Lemme see."

Silently, he handed over the character. He didn't bother telling Gibbs the amount to work and thought that went into the characters, especially the one in his hand. Didn't bother telling Gibbs that the Werewolf was his favorite out of the three either, sure that such an emotional attachment would be considered silly. Was also sure that Gibbs was curious only because he hadn't seen a role-play character like the one in his hand before and would write it off as something a little interesting, but not really worth the time to ask about in detail. To say Tim was surprised when Gibbs started interrogating him a few minutes later about the character would be an understatement. The flood of questions was almost overwhelming.

"What's Metis? Are you sure a sniper is a good concept for a Werewolf? What, exactly, does the Ahroun auspice influence as far as scores go? Why is the rage score higher than the willpower score?"

"Uh…"

Tony laughed. "I think you shocked him, Boss."

"Good." Gibbs allowed himself to flash a crooked grin, then addressed Tim again. "Since these two seem pretty enthralled with their characters, and I really like what I've seen of this one so far, why don't we give them a go?"

"Sure, Boss." Tim agreed out of habit, still shocked that Gibbs wanted anything to do with the game. "Whenever you like."

"Sunday. 1800. My house." After everybody nodded in agreement, he leaned over slightly and tapped Tim on top of the head. Tim shook himself a little to snap out of the flabbergasted daze he'd fallen into for a moment and looked up at his Boss. "You finish your character there," he said, pointing to the half-finished Mage character Tim had been working on before this whole bizarre conversation started. "I need the book for this, so I can get a good idea of what's going on with this game."

Once Tim had handed the Werewolf book over and everybody got back to work, Tim just shook his head, wondering what he'd just gotten himself into.

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End


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